Sunday, May 30, 2010

20100530.2139

What follows betrays my prejudices to no small degree.

With it being the day before Memorial Day, the typical impulse is to offer up a paean to the men and women of the United States Armed Forces. We are called by the very nature of the holiday to pause and reflect at what the sacrifices of others, and the willingness of still others to make sacrifices, on our behalf has purchased. And for those like myself, that purchase has been a hell of a bargain.

I realize that it is not so for all. I realize that barriers to service erected for no reason other than fear of the different still remain in place, though they are greatly weakened now and may soon fall. I am well aware that there remains great inequity in this country, that there are still times when justice does not prevail--or prevails too late to be truly just. I am aware that the men and women in uniform now are men and women like any others--willing to lay down their lives in the service of the greater good as they see it, certainly, but human and subject to flaw and failure.

I realize that the very country which has nurtured me and which many are sworn to serve is similarly a human enterprise, and so is similarly one that can be--and has been--in error. And that error, committed by whosoever errs, needs to be corrected.

But I also realize that the world in which we live is one that contains people who will not listen to reason, who will not put the good of others above their own immediate gain. I realize that there are people who are so destructive that they must be stopped, and so set in their own ways that only physical violence will dissuade their actions.

And I am damned glad that it is not me who has to enact that upon them.

So I do subscribe to the typical impulse in this. I do offer up my thanks to the men and women who serve in the Armed Forces.

Even if they err, they are willing, and that is more than can be said for many.

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